I saw an ad in The Morning Call on Tuesday for a store, Siren Records in Doylestown, that is selling 20,000 vinyl LP records.

They’re in boxes and you have to dig through them, but they’re only $4.95 apiece or two for $7.43.

It got me to wondering what role the vinyl LP has in music fans’ lives these days.

I’m one of those people who said they would stop playing vinyl when they pried it from my cold, dead fingers. I didn’t play the first few CDs I got as gifts because I dragged my feet big time in buying a player. I even remember the last vinyl album I bought new – Bob Dylan’s “Oh Mercy” -- and how I had to search to find it in that format.

But I rarely play my several-hundred-disc vinyl collection anymore. My wife even got me a great Christmas present last year that converts vinyl to CDs, and as much as I’m in love with the gift, I still haven’t used it because I just don’t play vinyl enough to make the effort. (I promise I will!)

My CD collection long ago far eclipsed my album collection, and these days I’m even wondering how long CDs will be the industry standard.

But the ad for vinyl caught my eye and made me nostalgeic. It made me remember getting Dylan's "Street Legal" and laying on the floor with my headphones on while marveling at its poetry and imagry. Or getting Dylan's "Slow Train Coming" and being moved to tears in my bedroom (as you can tell, Bob Dylan was a huge part of my vinyl years). Or buying Led Zeppelin's double-disc "Song Remains the Same" and actually getting two of one disc instead of the pair in the sleeve.

JOHN J. MOSER has been around long enough to have seen the original Ramones in a small club in New Jersey, U2 from the fourth row of a theater and Bob Dylan's born-again tours. But he also has the number for All-American Rejects' Nick Wheeler on his cell phone, wrote the first story ever done on Jack's Mannequin and hung out in Wiz Khalifa's hotel room.

OTHER CONTRIBUTORS

JODI DUCKETT: As The Morning Call's assistant features editor responsible for entertainment, she spends a lot of time surveying the music landscape and sizing up the Valley's festivals and club scene. She's no expert, but enjoys it all — especially artists who resonated in her younger years, such as Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, Tracy Chapman, Santana and Joni Mitchell.

KATHY LAUER-WILLIAMS enjoys all types of music, from roots rock and folk to classical and opera. Music has been a constant backdrop to her life since she first sat on the steps listening to her mother’s Broadway LPs when she was 2. Since becoming a mother herself, she has become well-versed on the growing genre of kindie rock and, with her son in tow, can boast she has seen a majority of the current kid’s performers from Dan Zanes to They Might Be Giants.

STEPHANIE SIGAFOOS: A Jersey native raised in Northeast PA, she was reared in a house littered with 8-tracks, 45s and cassette tapes of The Beatles, Elvis, Meatloaf and Billy Joel. She also grew up on the sounds of Reba McEntire, Garth Brooks and Tim McGraw and can be found traversing the countryside in search of the sounds of a steel guitar. A fan of today's 'new country,' she digs mainstream/country-pop crossovers like Lady Antebellum and Sugarland and other artists that illustrate the genre's diversity.